(c. 1223 – 24/25 June 1291. The site of her grave is unknown, making her the only English queen without a marked grave. Her heart was taken to London where it was buried at the Franciscan priory of Christchurch Greyfriars
She was a Provençal noblewoman who became Queen of England as the wife of King Henry III from 1236 until his death in 1272. She served as regent of England during the absence of her spouse in France in 1253.
Although she was completely devoted to her husband and staunchly defended him against the rebel Simon de Montfort, 6th Earl of Leicester, she was very much hated by the Londoners. This was because she had brought many relatives with her to England in her retinue; these were known as “the Savoyards”, and they were given influential positions in the government and realm. On one occasion, Eleanor’s barge was attacked by angry Londoners who pelted her with stones, mud, pieces of paving, rotten eggs and vegetables.
Eleanor had five children, including the future King Edward I of England. She also was renowned for her cleverness, skill at writing poetry, and as a leader of fashion.
Born in the city of Aix-en-Provence in southern France, she was the second daughter of Ramon Berenguer IV, Count of Provence (1198–1245) and Beatrice of Savoy (1198–1267), the daughter of Thomas I of Savoy and his wife Margaret of Geneva. She was well educated as a child and developed a strong love of reading, partly due to the influence of her tutor Romée de Villeneuve. Her three sisters also married kings. After her elder sister Margaret married Louis IX of France, their uncle William corresponded with Henry III of England to persuade him to marry Eleanor. Henry sought a dowry of up to twenty thousand silver marks to help offset the dowry he had just paid for his sister Isabella, but Eleanor’s father was able to negotiate this down to no dowry, just a promise to leave her ten thousand marks when he died.
Like her mother, grandmother, and sisters, Eleanor was renowned for her beauty. She was a dark-haired brunette with fine eyes. On 22 June 1235, Eleanor was betrothed to King Henry III (1207–1272). Eleanor was probably born latest in 1223.
wedding of Eleanor and Henry III depicted by Matthew Paris in the 1250s, showing their age gap; he was 28, she was perhaps 12 or 13.
Eleanor was married to King Henry III at Canterbury Cathedral on 14th January 1236. Henry was then twenty-eight. She had never seen Henry prior to the wedding at Canterbury Cathedral and had never set foot in his kingdom. Edmund Rich, Archbishop of Canterbury, officiated. She was dressed in a shimmering golden dress that fitted tightly at the waist and flared out to wide pleats at her feet. The sleeves were long and lined with ermine. After riding to London the same day where a procession of citizens greeted the bridal pair, Eleanor was crowned queen consort of England in a ceremony at Westminster Abbey which was followed by a magnificent banquet with the entire nobility in full attendance. Her love for her husband grew significantly from 1236 onward.Henry was well pleased with his new wife and the couple became devoted to each other. Eleanor’s three sisters also married kings, the eldest Margaret married Louis IX of France, her sister Sanchia was married to Henry’s younger brother Richard Earl of Cornwall, known as King of the Romans and the youngest, Beatrice married Charles I of Sicily.
Eleanor was a loyal and faithful consort to Henry, but unpopular due the the “Savoyards” and her influence with the King and her unpopularity with the English barons created friction during Henry’s reign. Her uncle William of Savoy became a close advisor of her husband, displacing and displeasing English barons. She was personally responsible for marrying some of her female Savoyard relatives to members of the English aristocracy. One hundred and seventy Savoyards enjoyed English royal patronage.
Eleanor of Provence was a forceful personality, strong-willed and determined with a great deal of common sense that turned this determination to practical use. Henry III clearly appreciated the strength in her character for in his will written before he left for Gascony in 1253, the king left his kingdom and his children, most particularly, his heir, in her care. This was despite the fact that Eleanor and henry supported different factions at times. He never changed this will. Their marriage was remarkable for their mutual fidelity, and their concern for the welfare of their children. Under her influence, the role of queen-consort developed in several areas, especially in the scale of income considered requisite for a queen’s needs and in the manner in which it was managed. She acquired a political authority that was interpreted as interference by contemporary commentators who sowed the seeds of her unpopularity.
Though Eleanor and Henry supported different factions at times, she was made regent of England when her husband left for Gascony in 1253. Eleanor was devoted to her husband’s cause, stoutly contested Simon de Montfort, and raised troops in France for Henry. After rebel barons captured Henry and took over the government in May 1264, Eleanor became the leader of the royalist exiles in France. She raised an invasion force, but her fleet was wrecked at Sluis, Flanders. Nevertheless, the rebels were crushed in August 1265, and Eleanor then returned to England
On 13 July 1263, she was sailing down the Thames when her barge was attacked by citizens of London. Eleanor stoutly hated the Londoners, who returned her hatred; in revenge for their dislike, Eleanor had demanded from the city all the back payments due on the monetary tribute known as queen-gold, by which she received a tenth of all fines which came to the Crown. In addition to the queen-gold, other such fines were levied on the citizens by the Queen on the thinnest of pretexts. In fear for her life as she was pelted with stones, loose pieces of paving, dried mud, rotten eggs and vegetables, Eleanor was rescued by Thomas Fitzthomas, the Mayor of London, and took refuge at the bishop of London’s home.
In 1272, Henry died, and her son Edward, who was 33 years old, became king of England. She remained in England as queen dowager and raised several of her grandchildren: Two of Edward’s children, Henry and Eleanor, as well as Beatrice’s son John of Brittany. When her grandson Henry died in her care in 1274, Eleanor went into mourning and gave orders for his heart to be buried at the priory at Guildford, which she founded in his memory. In January 1275, she expelled the Jews from all of her lands. Eleanor’s two remaining daughters died in 1275, Margaret on 26 February and Beatrice on 24 March.
She retired in 1286 to Amesbury Priory in Wiltshire, eight miles north of Salisbury, where she was visited by her son, King Edward. Two of her granddaughters – Mary of Woodstock (daughter of Edward) and Eleanor of Brittany – were already nuns there, each having entered the priory on reaching the age of seven.
Eleanor died on 24/25 June 1291 at the priory and was buried there. The site of her grave is unknown, making her the only English queen without a marked grave. Her heart was taken to London where it was buried at the Franciscan priory of Greyfriars.
Eleanor was renowned for her learning, cleverness, and skill at writing poetry, as well as her beauty; she was also known as a leader of fashion, continually importing clothes from France. She favoured red silk damask and often wore parti-coloured cottes (a type of tunic), gold or silver girdles into which a dagger was casually thrust, and decorations of gilt quatrefoil. To cover her dark hair, she wore jaunty pillbox caps. Eleanor introduced a new type of wimple to England, which was high, “into which the head receded until the face seemed like a flower in an enveloping spathe”.
She had developed a love for the songs of the troubadours as a child and continued this interest into adulthood. She bought many romantic and historical books that included stories from ancient times to contemporary romances written in the period (13th century).
Eleanor is the protagonist and main character in a number of novels over the years.
Her first son, the future Edward I, was born on the 17th of June, 1239. Her youngest daughter Katherine was deaf and mute from birth, Katherine died aged three on 3 May 1257, after which both Henry and Eleanor were said to be heartbroken, Eleanor becoming sick with grief.Eleanor and Henry had five children together and. Eleanor seems to have been especially devoted to her eldest son, Edward; when he was deathly ill in 1246, she stayed with him at the abbey at Beaulieu in Hampshire for three weeks, long past the time allowed by monastic rules .She personally supervised Edward’s upbringing and education. It was because of her influence that King Henry granted the duchy of Gascony to Edward in 1249.
Her youngest child, Katherine, seems to have had a degenerative disease that rendered her deaf and mute from birth. When the little girl died at the age of three, both her royal parents suffered overwhelming grief. Eleanor possibly had four other sons who also died in childhood, but their existence is in doubt as there is no contemporary record of them.
SDW
Sources Wikipedia; Britannica; English Monarchs .co.uk; Encyclopedia.com; The Freelance History Writer. image wiki
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